Field
The present invention relates to a liquid gas separator that is configured to separate water included in an off-gas discharged from a fuel cell and discharge the separated water.
Related Art
An electrolyte membrane used for a fuel cell such as a polymer electrolyte fuel cell has high power generation performance in the highly moist state. A reactive gas supplied to the fuel cell may thus be humidified for this purpose. In order to improve the utilization rate of the reactive gas and suppress accumulation of water in the fuel cell, a circulation-type reactive gas supply mechanism may be provided to separate water from an off-gas discharged from the fuel cell and resupply the off-gas after separation of water as the reactive gas to the fuel cell. In this reactive gas supply mechanism, a gas liquid separator is used to separate water from the off-gas. For example, a proposed configuration of the gas liquid separator includes a tubular gas liquid separating portion and a reservoir that is located vertically below the gas liquid separating portion. The gas liquid separator of this proposed configuration separates water from an anode off-gas flowing into the gas liquid separator and temporarily stores the separated water in the reservoir while discharging the off-gas after separation of water (JP 2011-16039A). This gas liquid separator has an off-gas inlet conduit and an off-gas outlet conduit that are formed to pass through the gas liquid separator in its thickness direction.
A fuel cell system including the gas liquid separator of the above configuration may be mounted on a moving body such as a vehicle. In the case where the gas liquid separator is inclined, for example, during a run of the moving body on a slope, there is a likelihood that water accumulated in the reservoir enters the off-gas outlet conduit, an off-gas outlet of the gas liquid separator. Water entering the off-gas outlet of the gas liquid separator is included again in the off-gas, and the off-gas including such water is circulated. This results in decreasing the separation efficiency of water from the off-gas. There is accordingly a need to provide a technique that suppresses water separated from an off-gas from entering an off-gas outlet of a gas liquid separator.